Mobile advertisers, whether they place ads inside the mobile browser or inside apps, are feeling pressure to create ads that mobile users don’t hate or want to block.

They’re using all kinds of social, demographic, psychographic, and behavioral data to make ads more relevant.

But Brian Wong, cofounder and CEO of the mobile rewards platform Kiip, believes advertisers can make ads more relevant by wrapping them with contextual information like location, time of day, or weather.

For instance, Wong said, if the user’s phone knows that it’s cold outside, that data could be used to trigger an offer for a free hot chocolate.

Kiip places rewards around key moments in an app (gaining a gaming level, or completing an exercise goal) and asks users to collect free stuff in exchange for their email address.

Context could also reflect the activities or status of the phone user. If the accelerometer in the phone detects that the user isn’t nearby, it might know to save an offer notification until the user is looking at the screen.

The ability of a mobile ad to engage a user is a very serious issue. Brands will spend more than $100 billion on mobile ads in 2016, says eMarketer, and mobile ads will account for more than half of all digital ads for the first time. Yet users only interact with 1 percent of mobile ads.

Meanwhile, the ad blocking controversy has created what Wong called a “watershed moment,” in which advertisers are thinking hard about the quality and relevancy of their mobile ads, and users’ tolerance for them.

Wong also pointed out that the mobile ad industry is changing the way it measures the effectiveness of mobile ads. Advertisers have been focused on CPM (cost per thousand impressions) models for a long time. But brands, he said, are now more interested in paying for ads based on how many of them actually convince a user to take some action, like buying a product or downloading an app.

]]>http://venturebeat.com/2015/11/10/kiips-wong-mobile-advertisers-need-to-wrap-more-contextual-data-around-ads/feed/01837254Kiip’s Wong: Mobile advertisers need to wrap more contextual data around adsWhy mobile marketing is all about the momenthttp://venturebeat.com/2014/04/01/why-mobile-marketing-is-all-about-the-moment/
http://venturebeat.com/2014/04/01/why-mobile-marketing-is-all-about-the-moment/#respondTue, 01 Apr 2014 13:30:57 +0000http://venturebeat.com/?p=1270333GUEST: Mobile opens an incredibly powerful medium to reach users throughout their day. Moments are this medium.
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Those words come from Adam Bain, Twitter’s chief revenue officer. While he was talking about Twitter’s approach to making money, I believe his statement is particularly relevant for the mobile channel.

The concept of moments is starting to pick up steam in the industry. Even the company that ushered in the smartphone era is diving in. While it got lost in the midst of iOS 7’s facelift, I was particularly excited by Jony Ive’s new approach to organizing photos by years, collections and — you guessed it — moments.

Mobile opens an incredibly powerful medium to reach users throughout their day. Moments are this medium. Let’s dive deeper into the moments taking place on mobile and how brands can get in on the action.

Understanding the Moment

To succeed on mobile, brands need to understand consumption habits on the phone. The smartphone is so closely connected to our lives, so we use it based on our needs. To cite a few examples:

When we wake up, we go on a run and track our time.

When we’re bored, we play a game and level up.

When we’re feeling productive, we tackle our to-do list.

When we discover a new song, we add it to a playlist.

When we’re planning dinner, we bookmark a recipe.

These everyday moments are meaningful actions that carry powerful emotion and a sense of accomplishment. Consumers are naturally happy in these moments, and there are literally billions of them occurring on mobile. Last year at Kiip, we tracked more than two billion moments in 2013 alone in all kinds of apps, from fitness and health to cooking and gaming.

Our digital lives are overstuffed with moments where brands can play a meaningful part, but marketers must remember to respect the moment.

Abusing the Moment

Brands and advertisers are guilty of taking old ways of thinking and applying it to this new medium. The conventional (and lazy) approach assumes that because mobile has a smaller screen, the same ad can simply be borrowed from the web and shrunk in size.

Mobile marketing is not about real estate, however, it’s about adding value by tapping into patterns of existing behavior. Brands too often make the mistake of forcing consumers to align with them: If you watch this video about our product and tweet about us, we’ll enter you into these sweepstakes.

That’s altering consumer behavior, asking them to go out of their way to do something they have little interest in doing. Too much of mobile advertising forgets the human element. Take a human approach in your mobile marketing efforts.

Owning the Moment

The beauty of the moment from a marketer’s perspective is that it allows them to leverage emotional highs, where consumers are more receptive to brand engagement. This is the ideal context for delivering the right message that can help acquire customers and increase loyalty, whether it is a product sample, digital coupon, reward that reciprocates their achievement or other form of engagement.

One key to owning the moment is to keep engagement serendipitous — that is, unexpected. When a husband surprises his wife with a bouquet of flowers, it’s much more effective than if she expects it. In mobile advertising, it’s really easy to settle for a banner ad, but that squanders an opportunity to make a meaningful connection.

I invite you to take the unexpected route and be the gentleman to your audience. Capture the moment on mobile.

Brian Wong is CEO and co-founder of Kiip, a mobile rewards network named one of the world’s 50 Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company. Brian is one of the youngest people to ever receive venture capital funding and has been named to Forbes’ 30 Under 30 for three years running.

Kiip is teaming up to provide rewards in mobile games developed by Russia’s ZeptoLab, including those in the Cut the Rope series, which have been downloaded more than 300 million times.

Brian Wong, the chief executive of San Francisco-based Kiip, said the deal is an endorsement from the developer of “one of the biggest mobile games on the planet.” The Kiip system will be integrated into all versions across all devices.

Kiip rewards gaming moments, such as when you reach the end of a level in a game. Once you hit such a moment, you can redeem a Kiip reward such as a Starbucks gift card. The rewards system will be built into Cut the Rope, Cut the Rope: Time Travel, and Pudding Monsters in both the iOS and Android versions.

It’s not clear just yet if Cut the Rope 2, which is debuting soon, will also use the Kiip system. Kiip has been integrated into 1,500 other mobile apps and games.

Mobile rewards network PaeDae has raised $11.6 million in funding to expand beyond rewards to new forms of premium advertising.

Above: PaeDae CEO Rob Emrich.

Image Credit: PaeDae

The Santa Monica, Calif.-based company hopes to create a new generation of advertising tools to help game and app creators retain and engage users for longer times. In doing so, it hopes to become a bigger player in helping mobile developers to monetize their wares as mobile advertising heads toward a $25 billion business by 2016.

“In order to continue to meet demand for quality mobile ads from the advertiser and developer communities, we must extend our reach beyond rewards and into other forms of premium advertising,” said PaeDae founder and CEO Rob Emrich. “Our scope may change, but our core mission will remain to provide users with ads that are nondisruptive, contextual, and connective. Our user-centric model will enable us to apply the attributes of reward-based advertising to new mediums.”

The mixture of equity and debt funding comes from 20 parties, including Ed Ojdana (founder of FreeCreditReport.com and Experian), 3G Capital, Grind Games, and Silicon Valley Bank. The company says the funding validates the potential of premium brand advertising on mobile.

The money will fuel PaeDae’s expansion from a premium rewards network to a white-label, user-centric advertising and monetization platform for brands and mobile game developers alike. The company will create more tools for mobile video, user acquisition, app discovery, and rich media. So far, PaeDae believes mobile has been a direct-response medium that has annoyed or disrupted consumers. It wants to turn the mobile experience into a real, opt-in experience that will allow users to engage with brands in a meaningful way.

PaeDae says the money will also augment its proprietary mobile user-attribution technology that has won it ad campaigns from brands including 7-Eleven, Hershey’s, State Farm, and Time Warner Cable. That means it can target users that those brands want to reach. PaeDae said that apps with its software development kit saw a 90 percent boost in initial engagement levels.

“PaeDae’s ability to combine technological innovation with top-notch creative makes it a force to be reckoned with in the mobile advertising space,” said Ojdana, a PaeDae investor. “I’m thrilled to be involved, as they realize their vision of providing brands and developers with an impactful way to engage consumers.”

PaeDae is used in games from more than 150,000 game developers. Emrich and Sam Goldberg cofounded PaeDae in 2011, and it has 16 employees. PaeDae has raised more than $12.5 million in equity and debt to date. Emrich, a serial entrepreneur, previously started Bulx, a private sales e-commerce company that was acquired in 2011.

The company powers white-label rewards platforms for Cie Games, Atomic Bullfrog, GameDuell, and more. Competitors include Kiip, SessionM and Pocket Change. PaeDae claims it gets better results because it operates as a white-label service, allowing game and app makers to engage with users with whom they’ve already built a relationship and trust.

“Our funding speaks to the industry-wide groundswell of enthusiasm for premium brand advertising on mobile,” Emrich said. “User-centric ads on mobile devices open the door for brands to impact millions of consumers in a timely and meaningful way, and give them the opportunity to nurture long-term relationships that are mutually rewarding.”

]]>http://venturebeat.com/2013/12/10/paedae-reels-in-11-6m-to-expand-beyond-mobile-game-rewards/feed/0869815PaeDae gets a pay day as it collects $11.6M to expand beyond mobile game rewardsPlaystudios launches MyVegas Slots mobile game with real-world rewards at MGM propertieshttp://venturebeat.com/2013/11/06/playstudios-launches-myvegas-slots-mobile-game-with-real-world-rewards-at-mgm-properties/
http://venturebeat.com/2013/11/06/playstudios-launches-myvegas-slots-mobile-game-with-real-world-rewards-at-mgm-properties/#commentsWed, 06 Nov 2013 14:00:49 +0000http://venturebeat.com/?p=846439Players of the social mobile slot game can win "comps" at Las Vegas casinos.
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Advancing one of the big alliances in social casino games, Playstudios is launching a mobile version of its social casino slots game MyVegas in partnership with MGM Resorts International, the owner of a host of casino and entertainment properties in Las Vegas and around the globe.

Playstudios is using its popular free-to-play social casino game to pioneer new real-world rewards for its players. If players play the game enough, they can earn rewards such as stays in MGM’s Las Vegas hotels such as the Bellagio, Mandalay Bay, and The Mirage. The company launched its Facebook game in May 2012 and it reached more than 4 million players, including 250,000 that are active on a daily basis. Now it is launching MyVegas Slots for Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android mobile devices.

MyVegas is also adding four new rewards program partners, including Cirque du Soleil, House of Blues, Sugar Factory, and the Las Vegas Monorail. That means players will be able to earn prizes from those partners and cash those “comps” in Las Vegas and elsewhere. More than 100,000 players have already redeemed more than $10 million worth of real-world rewards as part of the Facebook game. The number of players might seem small compared to social casino game operators like Zynga, which has tens of millions of players.

“We have create our own unique flavor of casino games and complemented that with reward world rewards,” said Andrew Pascal, chief executive of Burlingame, Calif.-based Playstudios, said in an interview with GamesBeat. “You journey through your own virtual Las Vegas and earn rewards. It adds a whole meta layer to the experience. We’ve taken the lessons and applied them to our mobile product.”

He said that his players are extremely valuable because of the connection to the reward programs. Las Vegas hotels spend tons of money on advertising to try to get people to come to their resorts. But MyVegas has loyal players who play for both fun and rewards, and they’re getting exposed to the MGM Resorts brands in a big way.

“In all the metrics that matter,” Pascal said, “such as average spend per average daily user, average revenue per user, and percentage of players that monetize, we do better.”

More than two-thirds of the responses that come back to marketing efforts come via mobile devices, Pascal said.

“Up until now, we couldn’t accommodate them,” he said.”We expect that are business can more than double or triple thanks to mobile.”

The customers play a free-to-play casino game that does not constitute real-money gambling. Players can spend money in the game if they want, but they can’t cash out — except by winning partner rewards. Players can earn points in virtual slot games based on properties such as Mirage, Excalibur, New York New York, Frontier Fortune, Pirates Cove, and Luxor. Players try to win chips, loyalty points, status, and real-world rewards.

MGM’s properties are plentiful, spanning resorts, restaurants, and shows. It has its own loyalty rewards program, M Life, and MyVegas has been integrated into it.

“MyVegas feels like an extension of the rewards for the M Life program that we have,” said Tom Mikulich, senior vice president of business development for MGM Resorts International, in an interview. “MyVegas is a tremendous channel. When we send out offers, many people don’t open them. But the customers on these games may play 22 minutes per session, three times a day. We create a bond with the customers through MyVegas. And the next time they book, they book through us.”

Mikulich said his company has 40,000 hotel rooms in Las Vegas, of a larger market of about 170,000 rooms or so. His goal is to fill his rooms with players acquired through apps such as MyVegas.

“What’s important is to leverage rewards in a way that is totally contextual for your game,” Pascal said.

So that doesn’t necessarily mean that rewards will work with any kind of game.

“We have figured out the model and the way to do it, and there’s a lot of complexity,” Pascal said. “Our loyalty program that we have built is one of the most complicated out there.”

The cross-promotion between MGM and Playstudios adds up to big marketing for the social casino game. Over the next six weeks, Playstudios is doing a MyVegas meetup tour across nine cities. MGM, for instance, advertises the app heavily across Las Vegas, putting it on the backs of hotel room cards.

“The community being built in the game is incredible, as people who never met each other now get to meet in real live,” Mikulich said.

Kiip has made a name for itself by offering real-world rewards in games and expanding that business to all mobile apps. In recognition of that innovation, the company is announcing today that it has received an unspecified investment from American Express.

American Express Ventures is investing in the San Francisco company at a time when Kiip is moving beyond games to rewarding special “moments” that arise in a variety of apps. In games, those moments are when players achieve high scores or complete levels.

“Every once in a while, you come across partnerships and collaboration opportunities that just make sense,” said Brian Wong, chief executive of Kiip, in a statement.

The 3-year-old company, run by a 22-year-old, has come a long way in partnering with the financial services giant, which is trying to adapt to the world of digital payments and rewards.

“We have evolved beyond media and advertising into a company that builds value into every moment,” Wong said.

Wong said that he has worked closely with American Express Ventures’ Harshul Sanghi, who heads the group based in Silicon Valley.

]]>http://venturebeat.com/2013/08/15/mobile-rewards-startup-kiip-raises-funding-from-american-express/feed/0794179Mobile rewards startup Kiip raises funding from American ExpressZynga partners with SessionM to launch in-game real-world rewards (exclusive)http://venturebeat.com/2013/07/17/zynga-partners-with-sessionm-to-launch-in-game-real-world-rewards-exclusive/
http://venturebeat.com/2013/07/17/zynga-partners-with-sessionm-to-launch-in-game-real-world-rewards-exclusive/#respondWed, 17 Jul 2013 13:00:46 +0000http://venturebeat.com/?p=780542Play games and earn real-life rewards.
]]>One day, we’ll get paid to play games. But until that day comes, in-game rewards are the next best thing.

SessionM and social gaming publisher Zynga have partnered to provide in-game, real-world rewards for players. Boston-based SessionM specializes in such rewards through its mobile loyalty and ad platform. It will embed its redeemable rewards in Zynga’s Scramble With Friends mobile social game.

SessionM will provide mPoints to players who unlock in-game achievements. Those points can be redeemed for real-world rewards, such as iTunes and Amazon gift cards. They can also be used to enter SessionM sweepstakes and contests. Their hope is to attack a big problem: about 70 percent of consumers drop an app after just one use.

Starting in July, players will see an icon within Scramble With Friends, giving them the option to play for achievements and earn loyalty points. The partnership will reward active, loyal players while giving brand advertisers new opportunities to provide valuable engagement-based video ads that are entirely opt-in.

“Zynga is committed to delivering the most innovative and meaningful ways for our global network of players to engage with their favorite brands,” said Adam Sussman, senior vice president of sales and distribution for Zynga. “Partnering with SessionM enables us to launch Zynga’s first mobile real-world rewards program to benefit our players while providing a unique value to brands, which can engage directly with their target audience.”

SessionM has been handing out these rewards to mobile game players for a while. It was founded in 2011 and its advertisers include State Farm, American Express, Degree, HBO, Ford, Old Navy, and Universal Studios.

“We are delighted to add Zynga to our growing list of partners as we endeavor to build the world’s largest mobile rewards network,” said Bill Clifford, chief revenue officer at SessionM. “Zynga’s massive, engaged audience will love being rewarded for their gameplay and brands will love the results they see from this proven platform. It’s a true ‘win’ for both.”

SessionM has 60 employees and it has raised $26.5 million to date from Charles River Ventures, Highland Capital, and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Developer partners include Crackle, Runtastic, Moviefone, The Weather Channel, Family Feud & Friends, MTV News, and Dictionary.com. The founders include Lars Albright, Scott Weller, and Mark Herrmann.

Kiip announced a renewal of its $100,000 Build Fund to inspire mobile app developers to create titles for its mobile-rewards network.

Above: Kiip chief executive Brian Wong.

Image Credit: Dean Takahashi

The mobile-rewards firm will dole out the new 2013 Creation Build Fund to 10 winning indie developers, each of whom will receive $10,000 in cash and $5,000 in services, said chief executive Brian Wong in an interview with GamesBeat. Kiip has built a fast-growing platform that gives a user an instant reward whenever he or she reaches a key milestone in a game or mobile app. Most of the rewards have been given out in games, but Kiip is expanding to other kinds of apps too.

Under the program, Pepsi’s Propel brand will sponsor the fitness and health portion of the fund. In that section, Kiip will encourage companies to create apps that give rewards to people for achieving their fitness and health goals. The brand’s goal is to kickstart rewards that motivate people to become healthier.

The theme of the fund for this year is “creation,” where an app can lead to the creation of a brand-new category. Kiip wants developers to take risks on apps that challenge assumptions and make huge leaps in imagination.

“The Kiip Build Fund is a fantastic experience for independent developers,” said Michael Leip, the CEO and founder of Lab 927, a 2012 Build Fund winner. “Aside from the obvious monetary benefit, you gain access to a great group of high-level peers and exceptional mentors who are pillars of the industry. The Build Fund holds the potential to take a small indie company from good to great.”

Partners who will donate services include Parse, Urban Airship, Amazon Web Services, Crittercism and Localytics. More than 800 games and apps use Kiip’s platform, and more than 70 consumer brands provide rewards. Kiip says a study showed that Kiip-enabled apps more than double the length of a typical user session and lead users to open the app 31 percent more. The brand partners include (formerly Kraft Foods), Pepsi, McDonald’s, American Apparel, Proctor & Gamble, Wrigley, 7-Eleven, Sony Music, Best Buy, Amazon, and Verizon.

Does advertising always have to operate within a pay to play model? PaeDae doesn’t think so, as it’s just announced a new platform called Bartr that developer can use to start advertising their mobile apps or games without spending a dime.

Bartr operates on a series of credits. Developers that run ads within their own apps and mobile games will earn credits, and they can use these to advertise in other applications at a targeted demographic.

“The great thing about Bartr is that we’re able to transform advertising into a resource for developers, rather than just another cost of marketing,” PaeDae cofounder and CEO Rob Emrich said in an interview with VentureBeat.

Bartr works off of the idea that developers need a high volume of people using their apps before they can really start making money. The problem with most advertising models is that you have to spend a lot to get the word out about your application or mobile game and hope that it brings in new users. If it doesn’t, then you’ve spent a lot of money and have nothing to show for it. Bartr removes the need to spend lots of money just to generate new users.

The new Bartr service is part of PaeDae’s overall strategy to create a deeper relationships with developers, which will hopefully entice them into using the startup’s core rewards/prize business. PaeDae makes money when advertisers (brands and businesses) pay to offer rewards available to users of mobile- and web-based games. PaeDae shares the revenue from these deals with developers. The reward service are all white-label, so it adds value to the app, providing something unique to its customers. The startup’s clients include Amazon, 1-800 Flowers, P&G, and StyleMint.

“[With Bartr], we’re starting with games, because that’s what we know,” PaeDae co-founder and VP of business development Sam Kim told me. He added that Bartr is set up to enable developers of all applications to participate, but that initially game developers would have a strong presence.

Right now it’s only available on iOS apps, but support for Android should roll out in the need future. Bartr itself won’t launch until March, but developers can download the SDK now via PaeDae’s website.

Founded in 2012, the Santa Monica, Calif.-based startup has raised over $1 million in seed funding and is seeking to raise a Series A round of funding in late 2013. PaeDae, which has 12 employees, faces competition from Kiip and a handful of others.

]]>http://venturebeat.com/2013/02/20/hey-devs-paedaes-bartr-turns-advertising-into-a-free-service/feed/0624889Hey, devs, PaeDae’s Bartr turns advertising into a free serviceAd giant Interpublic invests in mobile-rewards startup Kiiphttp://venturebeat.com/2013/01/16/ad-giant-interpublic-invests-in-mobile-rewards-startup-kiip/
http://venturebeat.com/2013/01/16/ad-giant-interpublic-invests-in-mobile-rewards-startup-kiip/#respondWed, 16 Jan 2013 12:00:28 +0000http://venturebeat.com/?p=604228Kiip has formed a strategic partnership with one of the biggest holding companies for ad agencies in the world.
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Play games. Win rewards. That simple slogan has created a big business for Kiip, which offers rewards for gamers on mobile devices at the moment of an achievement.

And that, in turn, has enabled Kiip to raise money from Interpublic, a global advertising holding company. The funding is part of an $11 million round that the company raised in December. Other investors include Relay Ventures, Hummer Winblad, True Ventures, and Digital Garage. But Kiip didn’t have approval to talk about Interpublic, known as IPG, until today.

San Francisco-based Kiip has also entered into a strategic partnership with IPG, whose holdings include the IPG Media Lab (which creates experimental advertisements) and IPG Media Brands, which will introduce top-tier marketers to Kiip, chief executive Brian Wong (pictured right, in the center) told GamesBeat. IPG manages $35 billion in global media spending for its clients.

“IPG is one of the big four firms that control most of the advertising in the world,” said Wong. “We think this will accelerate our growth.”

Kiip gives a reward such as a $5 Starbucks digital coupon when someone achieves a milestone in a game. The company rewards such moments with real-world rewards that are sponsored by big brands. That helps the brands get in touch with the mobile generation, a key demographic group that has grown up ignoring ads.

Kiip, however, enables monetization in a way that augments quality content, said Wong. Partner brands include American Apparel, Best Buy, Dr Pepper, McDonald’s, Carl’s Jr., Fandango, Intuit, Kraft (Mondelēz), Pepsi, P&G, and Sony Music. And more than 670 iOS and Android apps now use Kiip.

“The mobile engagement model is winning, and that’s good for us,” said Wong.

“IPG is committed to developing emerging technology, talent, and innovation and bringing new solutions to our clients,” said Michael I. Roth, the chairman and CEO of Interpublic. “IPG Mediabrands and the IPG Media Lab identified Kiip as a key player in the increasingly important mobile market, with a thoughtful and effective model that connects brands with the modern consumer. It’s always exciting when we can help our clients find new pathways to consumer engagement.”

Wong founded Kiip in 2010 with Courtney Guertin (pictured right) and Amadeus DeMarz (pictured left). In 2012, Wong said that the company had rewarded more than 1 billion “moments” in games. In the last 30 days, the company has tracked 300 million moments. And Wong said that one client last year saw 56 percent of its gamers redeem a mobile reward.

]]>http://venturebeat.com/2013/01/16/ad-giant-interpublic-invests-in-mobile-rewards-startup-kiip/feed/0604228Ad giant Interpublic invests in mobile-rewards startup KiipNew Kiip expands beyond mobile game rewards to other apps and platformshttp://venturebeat.com/2012/11/14/kiips-new-version-expands-beyond-mobile-game-rewards-to-all-sorts-of-apps-and-platforms/
http://venturebeat.com/2012/11/14/kiips-new-version-expands-beyond-mobile-game-rewards-to-all-sorts-of-apps-and-platforms/#respondWed, 14 Nov 2012 18:20:08 +0000http://venturebeat.com/?p=574496Kiip is moving to a broader group of rewards and advertising partners.
]]>Kiip is the mobile rewards company that embeds real-world and virtual rewards so that players become more loyal to apps in an opt-in way. It recently unveiled a new applications programming interface (API) that expands its potential market beyond game developers to the creators of any kind of apps.

With Kiip, the system identifies “moments” of achievement within a game or app. It then shows you a banner ad at the moment of the achievement. If you click on it, you can claim a reward for free stuff, such as a Starbucks gift card, from an advertiser. Now Kiip is expanding its reach for new kinds of advertising opportunities for its partners.

Brian Wong, the chief executive of San Francisco-based Kiip, said in an interview that it has redefined its growth by asking itself questions over the last two years. At first, it asked, “Why do just physical rewards?” And it added new virtual rewards that you could claim directly on your mobile device. That enabled Kiip to enter the mobile rewards market and start growing.

Then it asked, “Why just games?” and expanded its functionality to other apps. And now it is asking, “Why just mobile?” And so it is expanding beyond mobile platforms.

Wong said that HTML5 support is on the way and that should open up new opportunities to go beyond mobile devices to just about any web platform.

“This is where it gets super-exciting,” Wong said. “We realized that participating in rewards and creating them was not easy in the way that we executed them.

It will do so with “spot rewards,” where an advertiser can offer a reward for any reason. It doesn’t matter if you have reached an achievement in a game or not. Advertisers can reward you at particular “moments,” regardless of whether that is an achievement or leaderboard change.

“The idea is to get Kiip everywhere,” Wong said. “We’ll integrate with any platform with web support. Anything can be a moment for a reward.”

And that should generate more revenue for the developers that use Kiip and expand the available inventory for advertisers who want to reach users. Those include food-related apps and fitness apps. Utility apps are on the way as well. The API is now available for developers to integrate into their apps.

Kiip has raised $15 million to date.

]]>http://venturebeat.com/2012/11/14/kiips-new-version-expands-beyond-mobile-game-rewards-to-all-sorts-of-apps-and-platforms/feed/0574496New Kiip expands beyond mobile game rewards to other apps and platforms